In his best-known literary work, Gulliver's Travels, Swift conveys the image of a reasonable man through the concept of clothing . He describes clothing as a projective outer layer of skin and uses the same notion in A Modest Proposal. He creates a dichotomy between Gulliver and the Yahoos, suggesting that reason materializes through the adoption of clothing. However, in A Modest Proposal, it is the lack of clothing that evokes the concept. Swift calls the Irish "useless backs" who have "neither house nor clothes to cover themselves with." The language dehumanizes the Irish by breaking their bodies into redundant parts. Furthermore, the lack of clothing reduces these bodies to objects that cannot have reason, since they lack the necessary material to position themselves above the beasts. Thus, in need of clothes, the poor of A Modest Proposal become synonymous with the "dirty, disgusting and deformed" Yahoos of Gulliver's Travels. This is significant as it exposes how skin can be exploited to establish a social hierarchy. The proponent further claims that "those who are thrifty" can make "admirable ladies' gloves and good gentleman's summer boots" from their children's skin, establishing a corresponding economic hierarchy, correlating money and body value. Money allows people to afford the clothes that manufacture reason, and those who are poor and cannot afford this outer layer can never acquire the ability to reason. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The proponent's language is economic rather than emotional and "inhumanely solves a human problem through an economic calculation that ignores human love and treats the poor as if they were bandits." cattle", allowing him to distance himself from his proposal. As a good economist, the proponent specifically appeals to the reader's selfish greed, which according to Robert Phiddian is the highest point “within the terms of economic discourse”. As readers, we should find this level of greed repugnant and “reject the terms of economic discourse that regularize tyranny.” Throughout the text Swift frequently refers to London's landowners, who "have already devoured most of the parents" and therefore have the greatest rights over the children, Swift's most explicit attack in the text. Phiddian suggests that the landowners are the Anglo-Irish elite, so the cannibalization of children represents the rich feeding off the poor, further highlighted in the final paragraph by the writer's claims that his proposal "[will] give some pleasing the rich." References to landowners remind readers of William Petty's "utopianism" when, under Cromwell's rule, he took Irish land and distributed it among the English elite, causing many Irish citizens to starve due to severe poverty..